8 tips for a sustainable Christmas

Introduction

The mountains of garbage are piling up day by day during the Christmas season. Unfortunately, sustainability is often underplayed, especially at Christmas. We have therefore collected 8 tips for you on how you can celebrate a sustainable Christmas.

1. Matching wrapping paper for a sustainable Christmas

After Christmas there are large mountains of wrapping paper left over that end up straight in the bin. There are a variety of environmentally friendly alternatives to make your gifts look beautiful even without wrapping paper. This is how you get ever closer to your desire to celebrate a sustainable Christmas:

For example, you can use calendar sheets, newspapers and magazines to wrap your gifts in a unique way
Wrapping paper looks good and gives you the opportunity to write on or paint the gifts
If you have leftover fabric scraps, you can tie them as a bow around your gift to make it look more colorful
You can also easily use fabrics such as a scarf or tea towels to wrap the gift

2. Sustainable coffee

You have a capsule machine at home, but the waste of aluminum capsules makes you feel guilty? Especially on the cold days in winter, people drink more coffee and tea, which ultimately leads to increased waste production. Did you know that the natural decomposition of an aluminum capsule takes more than 200 years, can have health effects on the human body and that the production of these capsules alone leaves an enormous ecological footprint? Far too bad to associate a luxury food like coffee with it.

Our solution: The coffee capsules from My Coffee Cup! It consists of bio-based raw materials and is filled with organic coffee. In addition, the natural decomposition of the capsule is around 26 weeks.
Appropriate for winter, our Winter Special enchants your day with cozy warmth.

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3. Homemade gifts for Grandma & Grandpa

How about something that comes from the heart? Be it for grandma & grandpa, aunt & uncle or mom & dad. Before you have to worry about what you want to give as a gift for Christmas this year, homemade things like pesto, liqueur or roasted almonds are ideal and something everyone will be happy about. That's why we've picked out a delicious pesto recipe for you that you're guaranteed to make everyone happy this Christmas.

Basil pesto for a sustainable Christmas

Ingredients:

1 bunch of basil
30 g roasted pine nuts
30 g Parmesan
1 clove of garlic
some olive oil
Salt & Pepper

Preparation:

Basil, pine nuts, parmesan and garlic are placed in a bowl and then pureed.
Add some olive oil
Taste the pesto with salt and pepper

4. Sustainable Christmas: candles without paraffin and palm oil

Whether for the Advent wreath or for cozy evenings on the cold winter days - it's hard to imagine a Christmas without candles. But many people are not even aware of the side effects of some candles. In order to celebrate a sustainable Christmas, you should also pay attention to the ingredients in the candles.

Paraffin candles release various substances that are harmful to the environment and health. Paraffin, a byproduct of crude oil processing, is one of the biggest climate killers. Therefore, vegetable fats such as palm stearin are becoming increasingly important as an alternative to paraffin wax in candle making.

Vegetable stearin is mainly obtained from palm oil. So from monoculture plantations that are located where climate-friendly rainforests should actually grow. In Indonesia and Malaysia in particular, large parts of the tropical rainforest were destroyed for the cultivation of oil palms, which led to the extinction of species. Slash-and-burn agriculture also impacts the global climate.

Suitable alternatives

In Germany, many candles have the RAL quality seal. With the seal, the manufacturers have committed themselves not to use raw materials, paints or varnishes that are contaminated with harmful substances.

If you have a lot of tea lights with an aluminum holder at home but want to experience a sustainable Christmas, then you can buy plant-based tea lights without an aluminum rim and refill the old aluminum rings.

However, organic candles made from beeswax are best because they are produced in an environmentally friendly way.

5. Christmas tree in a pot

Around 30 million Christmas trees are sold every year in Germany alone and are thrown away after just a few days. Unfortunately, many of these Christmas trees come from monocultures and are treated with pesticides.

Solutions there are:

You can make sure that the Christmas tree comes from Germany and has an FSC seal. These come from nature-friendly forestry.
If you have a plastic Christmas tree at home, use it for as long as possible!
Another option is the Christmas tree from a pot. Do you already have a suitable plant at home or have you had a larger plant for your living room on your shopping list for a long time? Then the Christmas season is perfect to tackle it. Decorate your houseplant with Christmas decorations and you have already taken a big step towards being able to celebrate a sustainable Christmas.

Fun Fact: Are you a coffee drinker and want to become even more sustainable? The coffee capsules from My Coffee Cup are compostable. Take your used coffee capsules, cut them up and place the capsules in the soil when planting the plant. After about 26 weeks, the capsules will have naturally decomposed in your potted plant and you can look at your tree on Christmas Eve and look forward to a sustainable Christmas.

6. Christmas decoration

Christmas decorations brighten up our Advent season enormously. But here too there are some approaches that you can do for a sustainable Christmas! Instead of tinsel and Christmas balls, how about something from nature? Stars made of straw, figures made of beeswax or wood, dried orange slices or cinnamon sticks make your apartment look at least as Christmassy.

Instructions for dried orange slices

Of course you can also let the orange slices dry out in the oven, but with our method you can save a lot of energy!

Cut the oranges into 1 to 2 cm thick slices.
Pre-dry the slices a little by pressing them lightly between kitchen paper. Be careful not to damage too many fruit chambers.
Then place the slices on fresh kitchen paper so that the moisture can be better distributed and evaporated during drying.
Find a warm and airy place in your apartment where the orange slices can dry optimally. Radiators or sunny corners in the apartment are best suited.
Turn the orange slices every day.This means no mold forms, the panes dry faster and they stay straight.

Tip: If you change the kitchen paper more often in the first few days, it will speed up the drying process.

7. Sustainable Christmas market

Festivally decorated stalls, delicious food and good-smelling mulled wine throughout the city. This is how we all imagine a cozy Christmas market. Unfortunately, the truth often looks different. Overcrowded Christmas markets, cheap mulled wine and far too long queues at the food stalls. That's why many people are already looking for a more relaxed alternative.

An alternative is sustainable Christmas markets. Not only is organic mulled wine served there, but there are also vegan alternatives to bratwurst and a lot of stalls with handmade Christmas gifts.

Here you will find some sustainable Christmas markets listed. This makes it increasingly easier to celebrate a sustainable Christmas.

8th. Support local businesses for a sustainable Christmas

If you want to buy gifts, then if possible, don't order online from well-known giants, but instead focus on products in your area. There are certainly small manufacturers, socially responsible shops or unpackaged shops where you will find a special gift.

If there is no way around ordering online, you can find here 10 tips for more environmentally friendly orders.